Kutchicetus is an extinct genus of early carnivorous freshwater whale

Whale

Whale is the common name for various marine mammals of the order Cetacea. The term whale sometimes refers to all cetaceans, but more often it excludes dolphins and porpoises, which belong to suborder Odontoceti . This suborder also includes the sperm whale, killer whale, pilot whale, and beluga...

s of the family

Family (biology)

In biological classification, family is* a taxonomic rank. Other well-known ranks are life, domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, genus, and species, with family fitting between order and genus. As for the other well-known ranks, there is the option of an immediately lower rank, indicated by the...

 Remingtonocetidae

Remingtonocetidae

Remingtonocetidae is a family of early carnivorous freshwater aquatic mammals of the order Cetacea endemic to the coastline of the ancient Tethys Ocean during the Eocene living from 55.8—48.6 mya, existing for approximately ....

endemic to the coastline of the ancient Tethys Ocean

Tethys Ocean

The Tethys Ocean was an ocean that existed between the continents of Gondwana and Laurasia during the Mesozoic era before the opening of the Indian Ocean.-Modern theory:...

 during the Eocene

Eocene

The Eocene Epoch, lasting from about 56 to 34 million years ago , is a major division of the geologic timescale and the second epoch of the Paleogene Period in the Cenozoic Era. The Eocene spans the time from the end of the Palaeocene Epoch to the beginning of the Oligocene Epoch. The start of the...

 living from 55.8—40.4 mya, existing for approximately .

Taxonomy

Kutchicetus was named by Bajpai and Thewissen (2000). Its type is Kutchicetus minimus. It was synonymized subjectively with Andrewsiphius by Gingerich et al. (2001). It was assigned to Remingtonocetidae

Remingtonocetidae

Remingtonocetidae is a family of early carnivorous freshwater aquatic mammals of the order Cetacea endemic to the coastline of the ancient Tethys Ocean during the Eocene living from 55.8—48.6 mya, existing for approximately ....

by Bajpai and Thewissen (2000) and Thewissen et al. (2001).

Morphology

Kutchicetus had four working and usable limbs, a slender whale

Whale

Whale is the common name for various marine mammals of the order Cetacea. The term whale sometimes refers to all cetaceans, but more often it excludes dolphins and porpoises, which belong to suborder Odontoceti . This suborder also includes the sperm whale, killer whale, pilot whale, and beluga...

-like body with long tail and slender, hydrodynamic head.